00:00It's actually really hard to get data on Generation Z, those under 29, they just haven't been
00:07voting for that long and it's quite hard for pollsters to reach them.
00:11So we have this large sample of over 350,000 young Australians who've done the Vote Compass
00:17quiz and from that we found that 67% of women in that under 29 year old age category considered
00:25themselves to be left-leaning and that compared to about 50% in the male category in that age
00:31group.
00:32So quite a big gender gap there and young women were still far ahead of other women of other
00:37generations, about 52% of older women of all other generations identified as being left-leaning.
00:43So you have young women really way out on the left side of the political spectrum and data
00:49can only tell us so much and we've been talking to experts trying to unpack that and understand
00:53that and this is a worldwide trend, really that's been happening over years and decades.
00:58If we think about in generations gone by, women were actually considered a core part of the
01:04conservative voting bloc and if we think about the lives women used to live a lot of time
01:09in the home, they were often more religious than men, were less exposed to trade unions
01:13and left-wing ideas out of the home and that's why they were this conservative voting bloc but
01:18so much has changed.
01:19Obviously women are a core part of the workforce these days, highly educated, still more
01:23likely to be in care industries and professions like nursing and teaching and still do the
01:29majority of the domestic labour and a lot of households.
01:33They're more likely to care about social and environmental issues and all of those factors
01:37combined.
01:38Experts suggest is why women are moving to the left and becoming more and more progressive.
01:43I was chatting to some young women for this story and asking if they felt like any of the
01:49major parties represented them, spoke to an 18-year-old student, a Sydney student named
01:55Emma Garvey who said, not really, so let's take a listen.
01:59They're trying to appeal to young voters in general through like their use of like TikTok
02:05and stuff and just sort of like jumping on trends randomly but I don't think they're
02:09doing a lot with policy-wise to really connect to them.
02:13I feel like young people are leaning more greens than they are, young women are leaning more
02:19greens than they are Labor or Liberals due to like their really progressive policy.
02:25Our data of this sample suggests that about 50% of young men identify as being left-leaning,
02:31about 33% as right-wing and about 17% in the middle.
02:36So different to what has been seen overseas.
02:40That also sort of mirrors some other findings of other studies and polls.
02:45After the 2022 election, the Australian election study found that both young men and young women,
02:51about 67% had voted for the Greens or Labor and suggested that they were actually more
02:58progressive than any other generations gone by.
03:00So it's a different situation here in Australia.
03:03Difficult to know why exactly but I guess we've got different kinds of leaders, no one who's
03:07really probably rallying that populist message and maybe different values as well.
03:12We've heard from the Australian Electoral Commission who said that Australians are under 45,
03:16so that's Generation Z, but also millennials as well, they now outnumber baby boomers.
03:21So they're a really large part of the electorate, young women obviously a little over half of that.
03:28So if major parties aren't connecting with young women, that's a really big portion of the vote
03:32that they're missing out on and they are a little harder to connect to.
03:36Some politicians may argue they're not watching the traditional news, but they are on new media,
03:42places like YouTube, podcasts. And so we have seen this election, you know, the likes of the Prime
03:47Minister, Anthony Albanese, speaking to young female content creators, trying to tap into their
03:54large online engaged audience, going on podcasts with young female hosts. We've also seen some of
04:01that from the opposition leader, Peter Dutton. But as we heard from Emma Garvey, that student,
04:06a little earlier, you know, maybe young people don't like all of the daggy dancing on social media
04:12platforms or jumping on trends, but they're really looking for policies that speak to them and look
04:17to tackle the disadvantage they feel that they're having, the challenges of being a young person
04:23with those structural issues with the housing market, job market. So they're sort of suggesting
04:27a bit less of the social media stuff and maybe more policies for us.
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